FROM THE GROUND UP: Yeoville Sports Club in South Africa by Tsai Design Studio

The Yeoville sports field was originally an abandoned site in a quiet residential area on the edge of Cape Town. It was later cleaned up and transformed by the local community into a football field for young people, but still lacked the amenity to offer its full potential.

Tsai Design Studio took on the challenge in an urban regenerative effort to create “a family friendly, mixed-use, multilevel building with ramps and platforms that respond to the slopping contours of the site.”

The new design draws inspiration from the gentle slope of the site and sits almost as though it grew from the ground, and in a sense it did. Steps and slopes form the structure of design which is split into 2 levels.

The street level offers retail / gallery spaces and coffee shops, while the level on top contains a play area with its roof acting as a viewing deck or small amphitheater that serves to host small social functions for the community.

The result is a seamless flow that sits as a part or extension of the field, fulfilling the requirement of amenity and delivering a classy, contemporary structure for a deserving community.